Dunwich
by Red Slayer
Summary: Point Lookout is an evil place. After resting for the night in an abandoned prison, five scavengers find an unusual book. Then they find out the hard way just how evil Point Lookout really is. Contains blood, violence, a lot of swearing and horror.
1. It Begins

_**And now ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present to you my second ever fan fiction story. This will be a little side project from my main story: "The Girl with the Blood Red Hair", and will be a horror story set in Point Lookout, because I haven't seen any horror storys set in Point Lookout yet. Then again I haven't looked that hard. All characters are OC by the way.**_

It Begins

Point Lookout is a horrific place, of this there is no doubt. Scavengers travel there in droves with intent to search the ruins of the mostly intact town and the enigmatic swamp beyond, and hopefully to find something of value. The foul swamp holds more darkness and more evil than anywhere else in the world however, even the Capital Wasteland. "The Capital Wasteland has super mutants! And deathclaws!" Some might say. This is true, but the Capital Wasteland also has civilisation, it has survivors, and it has people who work to make it a better place. Point Lookout has none.

The Capital Wasteland has nothing that resembles evil. It has psychopaths true, but nothing that can be called true evil. Point Lookout has this in droves. In its dark history, many unspeakable acts have been committed in and around Point Lookout. It is a place of unbridled malevolence, and intent dark enough to shame even the devil himself.

Few know this, none of them the scavengers who come to pillage this forsaken land. If they knew the true nature of Point Lookout, they would swim back to the Capital Wasteland, screaming in horror as they did so. The place attracts decadence, pain and suffering, and few scavengers have ever visited it and made it out alive. Those who had, were never the same afterwards.

This tale focuses on a particular group of scavengers, and their encounter with the true darkness that lies within Point Lookout, and the swamps that hide that darkness from the world. We go now to our heroes. Pray for them, because they will face evil and horrors beyond imagination.

*Our heroes*

Archer looked up into the sky as he and his crew trudged through the swamp, watching the sun as it began to descend. It was going dark, and in the short time he and his team had been there, Archer had learnt that you didn't want to be out at dark in Point Lookout. The first night they'd stayed here, a member of the team named Danny had decided to journey on ahead. Morning came, and he still had not returned. They found him a few miles away, all the skin ripped off his face, and the exposed muscles and brain dripping blood to the ground. It had been a lesson well learned.

Archer was of average height, but he was quite muscular and an experienced wastelander. He'd been adventuring and scavenging for 25 years, and there were few back in the Capital Wasteland that could honestly say they were more skilled than him. Archer was now reaching his 40s, but his skills and his reflexes hadn't diminished in the slightest. He wore a large black vest with a red long sleeved undershirt and black trousers, a common merc adventurer outfit. His outfit was battered from how many battles it had been in so far, but it still served Archer well. He also wore thick black combat boots that were good for kicking an enemy's face in. Despite his age, there wasn't a single wrinkle on Archer's face. He had short, silver hair and piercing blue eyes. A scoped magnum sat in a holster on his belt, a veteran of several battles with Archer. A hunting rifle, a more recent addition to his arsenal, was holstered on his back.

Archer had spent most of his life journeying and scavenging the Capital Wasteland. It wasn't easy work, but it was exciting enough for his tastes, and he couldn't imagine himself doing anything else. About 5 years ago, he'd been surprised by a Yao Guai. The beast had damn near sliced his arm off, but he was saved by a woman named Christa. She walked just behind him now, and she'd been the first to join his crew.

Christa was in her early 30s, meaning she was a fair bit younger than Archer and had been when they'd met. This hadn't stopped them dating however, and they'd been a couple for about a year. Christa had ended the relationship since said relationship mostly involved sex (Not that the sex had been bad), Archer was incredibly overprotective of her, and she thought they'd function better as friends. Archer hadn't been pleased, but he'd agreed, and now 4 years later they were still friends.

Christa was a bit shorter than Archer and not as muscular, but she knew a few martial arts, and threw a lethal roundhouse kick. She wore a white vest, dark green cargo pants and had a small bag on her belt. The attire was known as a wasteland surgeon outfit, which was fitting because Christa was the team medic. She learnt everything she knew about medicine (Which was a lot), from Doc Church back in Megaton where she'd spent most of her early years after her parents had been killed by raiders. She didn't talk about it much, and punched anyone who asked, so no-one did.

Her vest was stained red with blood, and was more often than not covered with the stuff. It wasn't her blood though. Usually it was the blood of a creature she'd headshotted with her dual 10mm SMGs, or the blood of someone she'd treated. Christa had shoulder length dark brown hair, which had been dyed a burgundy colour at the tips. Her eyes were large and brown, and she had a light brown tan. Her dual SMGS hung from her belt, in easy reach.

"It'll be dark soon." Archer said needlessly as he, Christa and the rest of the group stopped for a second to decide their next course of action.

"We'll have to find somewhere to camp soon, or we'll end up like Danny." Christa added.

"Why couldn't you save him doc? You're supposed to be the best!" A thuggish looking brute in a merc cruiser outfit (White t shirt, torn black vest and brown cargo trousers) said. His name was Todd, and Danny had been his brother. Todd and Danny were the two most recent members of the team, having been members less than a year. Todd was the team's 'tank' and melee combat expert. That was a nice way of saying he was a brute of limited intelligence, who liked getting doped up on Buffout and smashing the crap out of an unlucky beast with his trusty sledgehammer, which he kept holstered on his back. Todd was bald, had small, grey eyes, lots of stubble, and was pretty much a solid wall of muscle. He was also around 6 foot 5, making him tower above every other member of the group. To make matters worse, he had a short temper, and had been incredibly devastated by Danny's death. More so, he had been pissed off, and immediately blamed Christa for being unable to resurrect his savagely mauled brother.

"I'm a doctor you idiot. I can't bring people back from the dead." Christa leant against a dying tree, glaring at Todd with a look in her eyes that said she thought he was an imbecile. The look wasn't far from the truth.

"He wasn't dead!" Todd roared in response, fists clenching angrily as he did so.

"I nearly slipped on the man's brains my friend. Most live people don't have their brains lying on the floor." A suave looking Hispanic man had spoken. He sat on a small rock nearby, and was currently putting a cigarette to his lips.

"Shut your mouth Enrique, before I shut it for you!" Todd yelled at Enrique. The Spaniard didn't bat an eyelid. He whipped out a lighter, engraved with numerous symbols and made out of a blackish metal. He then used the engraved lighter to light his cigarette, before taking a big puff of smoke.

"How would you shut my mouth my primitive friend, when you have trouble shutting your own?" Christa put her hands to her mouth, barely managing to avoid bursting into laughter. Archer eyed her curiously. She'd always found Enrique's insults hilarious. Archer himself was much more partial to Enrique's persuasion techniques. His uncanny ability to mediate had got them out of several bad situations in the past. Of course, Enrique also had a large sniper rifle holstered on his back which was in good condition, just in case he failed to talk his way out of a problem. He would then run away and snipe the enemy from a large distance.

Enrique wasn't particularly strong or muscular, but having a silver tongue, he didn't really need to be. Like Christa, he had a brown tan, but his was much darker. He had short, pitch black hair, with a fringe that occasionally dropped over his face from beneath the pre war hat he wore. In addition to the hat, he also wore a merc charmer outfit, which only added to his suave appearance. He wore a silver chain around his neck from which a silver medallion hung. He claimed he had found it in an abandoned mansion before meeting Archer, but had never revealed where the mansion was.

He and Archer had met shortly after Archer began dating Christa, and they'd become fast friends. After a drunken night in Moriarty's saloon, they'd both woken up naked in the Republic of Dave, with no idea how they'd got there. That had been the most interesting night of Archer's life, and surprisingly the most fun too.

Todd took a full five seconds to realize that Enrique was insulting him then stomped towards the Spaniard, obviously intending to break his nose, and probably his neck. Before he closed the distance between them by even half however, a bullet whizzed over his head. The shooter was a serious looking man with a black moustache, who wore leather armour and was currently leaning against a tree next to Enrique.

"If you two want to flirt, do it when I don't have a hole in my leg." The man said in an annoyed tone. The gun he had fired was a Shanxi Type 17 Chinese pistol. Usually considered absolutely useless as a firearm, the man had customized his extensively. Now it packed as much a punch as a typical magnum, if not more of a punch.

"Sorry Logan, but your B.O was getting on my nerves so I thought I'd just leave you next to that tree." Enrique quipped, as he had been supporting Logan as they'd limped through the swamp until only a moment ago.

"Enrique, Xianghua here is the only thing keeping Todd from beating you to within an inch of your life, so I could do without the sarcasm." Xianghua was the name of Logan's Chinese pistol, named after an old girlfriend. This was mostly because, as Logan put it: "The girl was the same nationality as the gun, looked just as pretty as it, and packed more of a punch'.

"Oh it wasn't sarcasm Logan, believe me. The smell of your sweat could drop a deathclaw." Logan didn't look amused, but that was normal. He was a very serious man, and the team's lone wolf. He was also a covert ops expert, which basically meant he liked sneaking up on enemies and stabbing them with the combat knife he kept tied to his belt. He was also a rebel, and clashed frequently with Archer. The fact that he was actually older than Archer however, and the fact that he had almost as much combat experience and skill as him, made Archer keep him around. There was also the fact that Logan was skilled at hacking terminals and demolitions in addition to his stealth skills. Logan had long, black hair that almost ran down to his shoulders. This had earned him some insults from Enrique, but a quick kick to the balls had shut Enrique up and put a permanent end to the insults.

Logan currently had a hole through his leg. This wasn't a fashion accessory, but a wound he had sustained during a battle earlier that day. While searching an abandoned farm in the middle of the swamp (Why there was a farm in the middle of the swamp, nobody knew), they had run across another group of scavengers. These scavengers hadn't been friendly, and had immediately opened fire. Archer's crew killed them, but Logan took a bullet through the leg during the battle. He was not pleased about it.

"Enough." Archer spoke up, putting an end to the argument. He had a sense of power about him that made it impossible not to obey. That was probably one of the reasons why he was such a good leader. "We need to keep moving. We have to find somewhere to make camp before nightfall, somewhere safe and secure where we can rest, and where we can treat Logan's leg."

"How about there?" Enrique asked casually, pointing at a large building in the distance as he did so. They were on a fairly high hill, which meant they could see most of the swamp, and they all saw the structure that Enrique was pointing at. The building itself wasn't that large, but it wasn't alone either. It stood in a large camp of several buildings. The camp was surrounded by a towering fence, and had a watchtower at each corner.

"Looks secure to me." Christa said, already standing up as she did so.

"And it's not too far away." Archer added, looking at Logan's blood soaked leg as he did so. "Alright, let's move."

*Later*

"Turtledove Detention Camp." Christa read off a sign as they arrived at the camp.

"A prison?" Todd asked, showing his embarrassingly low IQ by stating the obvious.

"Looks like a nice place." Enrique said sarcastically as he looked over the prison. The darkness gave the camp an uninviting appearance, and a sense of dread seemed to loom over the place. Several skeletal corpses littered the grounds surrounding the numerous prison buildings, and the whole place smelled like death.

"It's not pleasant but it's safe. It'll do for tonight." Archer said as they walked through the camp's front gate, which currently hung ajar. He immediately took charge. "Christa, you see if you can find any medical facilities around the camp that you can use. Take Logan with you. Enrique, get up on one of those watch towers and take first watch with your sniper rifle. Todd, you search the west side of the camp for any supplies. I'll search the east side." Nobody questioned their duties, and the team immediately split up.

*Christa*

Christa took over Enrique's duty of supporting Logan, and took him on a search for any medical facilities they could use. The search proved unpleasant, as Logan's limping made it slow going and Logan didn't like her very much, so limped as slowly as was humanly possible.

By now it had gone dark, and the moon was the only light as they searched the prison. In the short time they'd spent here, Christa had always found Point Lookout extremely creepy at nighttime. The swamp seemed much more malevolent and threatening once the sun fell, and there was of course Danny's fate. Whatever creatures roamed Point Lookout at night, they were more dangerous than what roamed during the day.

"Hey, careful!" Logan snapped as Christa accidently loosened her grip on him, and he almost tripped over a rock. She had been so caught up in her thoughts that she'd forgotten all about him. "Snap out of your fucking day dreams would you? I'd prefer not to bleed out because of your stupidity!"

"At the moment, I'm the only thing keeping you standing Logan. I could leave you here and just walk away." Christa replied irritably.

"What, and leave a patient in peril? Don't you doctor types make an oath to always help those in need?"

"I didn't, but if I did, I don't think the oath would apply to needlessly confrontational jackasses like you. Now shut the hell up for five minutes so I can focus on finding somewhere to treat you." Logan looked like he was about to reply, probably with an offensive phrase of some kind, but stopped himself before any word left his mouth. He didn't speak again as they continued to search, and before long they came across an abandoned medical tent. The tent was empty, apart from a single skeletal corpse that lay on a table in the middle of the tent. Christa pushed the pile of bones off the table, and helped Logan climb onto it. As Logan lay back on the table, Christa put down her medical bag on a nearby bed, and took out some white rubber gloves, which she quickly put on.

"Alright, let's get to work." She said pleasantly, but with a sadistic look on her face.

"You won't make this hurt will you?" Logan asked, a look of worry appearing on his face for the first time.

"Well Logan, I always try to make my treatments hurt as little as possible. For you however, I think I'll make an exception."

*Enrique"

Enrique would never admit this to anyone, lest his cocky facade be destroyed, but he was scared. Point Lookout, it chilled him to his very bone. It may have been the dark, imposing nature of the swamp, with its trees that always seemed to be leaning towards you, as though the whole swamp was a giant hand and the trees were fingers that were trying to grab you. Maybe it was the freakish dolls they kept finding everywhere, hanging on poles in clearings or surrounding rotting corpses. The dolls conveyed an aura of dread, and the hairs on the back of the Spaniard's neck stood on end whenever the group came across any. Whatever the cause was, Point Lookout was affecting him, more than any place they had been to before this had ever affected him.

He'd seen people be torn apart by ravenous deathclaws, or be raped then mutilated by psychopathic raiders, yet this place unnerved him more than anything he had ever seen or experienced in his entire life. It was as if a dark presence was bearing over him, watching his every move.

_Bullshit. _Enrique thought to himself as he sat on a chair in the south west guard tower, smoking another cigarette. There was a table in the watchtower, and Enrique was currently leaning on it, taking a long drag from his cigarette at the same time. He felt the sweet nicotine fill his lungs, but the usual calmness that a smoke brought didn't appear.

Enrique picked up his sniper rifle from the table where it lay, then sat up and walked to the edge of the watchtower. He pointed the rifle over the tower's sandbags and at the swamp around the camp, looking through the scope to spy for any threats as he did so. There were none, so he sat back down, depositing his rifle back on the table as he did so. He put his legs up on the table as he sat, and continued to enjoy his cigarette. He couldn't relax however, and had a sickening feeling that he was being watched, by some inhuman thing that hid in the swamps, using the darkness and the trees as cover.

_You really are getting paranoid._ Conveniently there was an ashtray on the table, so he finished his cigarette and deposited it in the tray, before reaching for another one in his pocket. As he searched for his cancer stick, Enrique didn't see a dark shape climb over the fence, and sneak into the camp.

*Archer*

Archer sat in what used to be the prison warden's office, drinking a bottle of vodka as he did so. _The only thing the Russians got right._ He thought randomly. Archer's mother had once said he had a drinking problem. He had politely and respectfully disagreed, then told her to go to hell. He'd been drunk at the time, which added some validity to his mother's statement. He'd cut down on his drinking since then, but still loved nothing more than a bottle of vodka at the end of the day.

He'd been searching the prison for a short while now, and found nothing of use. No sterile medical supplies, no guns that were in working order, and no food that wasn't older than him. He had however found some barracks, providing somewhere for the group to sleep for the night. There was also a luxurious double bed (Well, luxurious compared to the filthy bedroll he'd been sleeping on recently), in the warden's office, which is where Archer would be spending his night.

_This trip hasn't exactly paid off, truth be told._ He thought as he leaned back in the warden's chair, drinking deep from his bottle of vodka as he did so. _We haven't found much, and the stuff that we have found isn't nearly valuable enough to justify coming here._ He looked over at the bag that they carried their scavenged goods in as he thought this. He carried two bags, the bag containing his belongings, and the bag containing the scavenged stuff that they intended to sell. The bag of scavenged stuff wasn't even half full, and the stuff that was in there wasn't worth much. He wouldn't make more than 50 caps if he sold everything in that bag back in the Capital Wasteland.

Plus they'd lost Danny the first night they stayed in Point Lookout, and Logan was wounded. _This trip has been ill fated from the start. _He mused, as he reached the bottom of the vodka bottle. _Godammit, it's my fault Danny's dead. If I'd told the idiot not to venture out alone when it went dark, he wouldn't have been slaughtered by...whatever it was that slaughtered him. Fuck...what a mess. _As Archer tried to drink away his woes (A futile endeavor...ask anyone), he didn't bother to look out of the window behind him. The window offered a view of the whole camp, and if he'd looked then Archer would've seen a dark shape run fast, heading towards an abandoned medical tent.

*Logan*

"SON OF A BITCH!" He screamed as Christa started to sow up the hole in his leg. The pain was unreal, and he was certain that the bitch was being as rough as possible.

"Quit whining." She said unsympathetically as she began to thread a needle along the path of the wound. "I thought you were supposed to be the tough guy?"

"You're making it painful on purpose!"

"Yep." She smiled sweetly, before continuing her work. "Remember when you said you'd seen bigger tits than mine on a Super Mutant?"

"That was months ago!"

"I've been known to hold grudges for a long time Logan."

"I was drunk!"

"Inebriation is no excuse." Another expletive left Logan's mouth as Christa continued to thread the wound.

"Aren't you supposed to knock me out or some shit?" Logan asked pleadingly.

"With what Logan? Should I punch you in the face until you fall asleep?"

"I..."

"Actually, that's not a bad idea." Before Christa could carry out her threat, Logan saw a dark form enter the tent behind her. She felt its presence, but didn't turn around, thinking it was a member of the team.

"Behind you!" Logan exclaimed, reaching for Xianghua on his belt as he did so. Christa would've ignored him, thinking he was trying to trick her. She then realized that the form behind her probably wasn't friendly, and turned around.

A horrific form stood before her. It was at least 7 feet tall, and was roughly humanoid in shape. It wore a green jacket with black trousers and muddy black boots. Christa didn't care in the slightest about its clothes however. It was the thing's physical appearance that made her blood run cold. Specifically, it was the thing's horrific deformities. The thing's left arm was horribly swollen, and was probably twice as thick or as long as a human arm. The left arm's hand was the size of a super mutant's, and its fingers looked like they would completely wrap around her head if it grabbed her face. The thing's left arm was stunted, and half as long as a normal arm. The arm itself was swollen, though not as much as the other arm, but the hand was human sized. The most disturbing thing about the thing however was its face. Or rather, what it wore on its face. The thing had ripped some poor scavenger's face off, and wore it as a mask. The face had small holes cut into the forehead, which string ran through that allowed the thing to wear the face as a mask. The face was familiar however. It was Danny's face, and the expression was set in a look of pure horror. It was also stained with blood around the empty eye sockets, from where Danny's eyes had been ripped out. The thing was also holding a severed arm in its small right hand.

The thing with Danny's face stomped towards Christa, roaring some kind of inhuman battle cry as it did so. Christa reached for her SMGs, but the thing batted her aside with the severed arm, using the limb as some kind of grotesque club. Christa was knocked flying into the wall of the tent, and landed painfully on the tent's floor.

Logan drew Xianghua from his belt, and managed to sit up, albeit painfully. He fired two shots at the things chest, causing it to stumble backwards. Blood spurted from the wounds in its chest, but the thing didn't show any sign of pain. It roared another battle cry, before rushing towards Logan.

"Shit." Was all he had time to say before the thing struck him with the arm. It hit him in the face with the severed limb, knocking him off the bed and causing him to land on his back on the floor of the tent. He dropped Xianghua as he landed, causing it to land a few feet away from him. A sharp dagger of pain shot up his leg as it hit the floor, and he swore under his breath. Logan's vision began to blur as the thing with Danny's face stood over him, severed arm raised over its head as it prepared to strike the killing blow. Suddenly Logan began to feel a great sense of dread. _What if that thing takes my face?_ He thought hysterically. _What if I'm still alive when he does it?_

Logan felt his head swim, and his blurred vision began to darken. _And now I'm going to faint. Well, at least I won't be conscious when this thing takes my face._ The last thing Logan saw as he lost consciousness was the thing about to strike him, and the last thing he heard was Christa screaming for help.

**_Cliffhanger! If you're pissed off about that, then sue me. The darkness continues in the next chapter. Note that this will be less then 10 chapters in total, seeing as it's just a side project._**

**_Oh and feel free to review._**


	2. Whispers

_**Sorry this took so long, but it is a side project so will not be updated as frequently as my main story. Anyway, enjoy the terror.**_

Whispers

Christa screamed as loud as she possibly could. Not out of fear, but to alert the rest of the team. The volume of her scream rose to an ear splitting pitch, and the thing with Danny's face that currently stood over Logan's unconscious body, recoiled slightly. Its mammoth left hand went to its ears, and it grunted, as though in pain. _Whatever the fuck it is, it doesn't have much of a tolerance for loud noise._ Christa realised, and would've continued to scream, were her lungs not worn out from all the screaming she'd already been doing.

The thing with Danny's face turned its attention away from Logan, and turned to face her instead. It readied the severed arm it held as a club, and stomped towards Christa.

"I won't go down easy you piece of shit!" She yelled in defiance, before drawing both her SMGs from her belt. The thing didn't back away in the slightest, instead picking up speed. It quit stomping and instead ran towards Christa, roaring some kind of feral battle cry as it did so. Christa didn't back down, instead opening fire. The creature recoiled in what seemed to be pain as Christa unloaded with her twin SMGs. It held up its giant left arm to protect its face, and continued to run towards Christa. As the clips in her SMG ran low, the thing picked up speed.

Christa rolled to the side seconds before the thing hit her, and it collided with the bed on the other side of the tent. It stumbled onto the bed, dropping the arm it held and knocking all the medical equipment on the nearby table to the floor. Christa quickly reloaded her SMGs as the thing recovered, and took aim at its head. Before she could fire however, the thing picked up the bed that it had just stumbled into with both arms. _Crap._ Was the only thought in Christa's mind as the thing threw the bed at her as though it were made of paper.

Thinking fast, Christa darted towards the table that Logan had been lying on, and slid over it, landing in a crouch on the other side. The thrown bed just missed her, and smacked into the wall of the tent. The thing grunted in what seemed to be annoyance, then picked up the severed arm that served as its weapon and ran towards Christa again. She leaned out from behind the table and opened fire with her newly reloaded SMGs.

This time the thing didn't slow down, instead running straight through the bullets and climbing over the table. Still in a crouch, Christa rolled under the table to avoid the thing. Before she could get her breath back, a swollen fist smashed through the wood of the table above her. She recoiled back in fright as the hand just missed her. It reached down however and found her leg. Before Christa knew what was happening she was being pulled upwards by something with the strength of ten men.

Crippling pain filled the bones in her leg, and she knew that if the thing kept pulling with that much force, it would rip her leg clean off. Maybe that's what it wanted. Ignoring the pain, Christa aimed upwards and opened fire once again with her SMGs. Bullet holes instantly appeared in the table above her, and blood began to pour through the holes before dripping onto her face. The blood smelt...wrong...no human's blood should smell like that.

She managed to ignore the repulsion that threatened to make her vomit, and instead kept firing upwards. In such a small space the gunshots echoed massively, nearly deafening her. Still, her fingers did not leave the triggers of her weapons and she continued to fire. The thing did not have as good a grip as her, and after firing for ten seconds straight she felt it let go of her leg. Then she heard two telltale clicks that told her that her guns were empty, seconds before the table rose into the air.

She looked up to see that the thing with Danny's face had lifted the table. It had dropped the severed arm on the ground and now held the table with both hands, lifting the huge thing with ease. It threw the table into a corner of the tent, before stomping towards her.

"Do your worst you..." The thing never got the chance to oblige her, as its chest suddenly exploded, spraying more of its _wrong _blood all over Christa. A bullet hole the size of a 30mm round decorated the thing's chest, a hole that passed straight through it. Christa could almost see through the hole. The thing screamed in pain and anger, and turned to face its assailant. Christa couldn't see what it saw, but she heard a familiar voice.

"Christ alive!" Enrique exclaimed, his Spanish accent the most beautiful thing Christa had ever heard. "I've got to tell you my deformed friend...the mask isn't really doing anything for your appearance." The thing ignored Enrique's taunt and instead rushed him. Christa got to her feet just in time to see Enrique blow another hole through the thing's chest. It stumbled backwards, but didn't look close to death by any means. She looked around for a way to help Enrique, and saw a bonesaw lying on the floor of the tent, probably knocked there when the thing collided with the bed earlier. Without thinking, Christa bent down to grab the saw, then rushed towards the thing. If it sensed her presence, it didn't show it, and Christa found no resistance as she stabbed the saw into the thing's skull.

The effect was instantaneous. The thing screamed in pain, and blood began to pour from its head. Enrique took full advantage of the thing's discomfort, and fired another 30mm round. This proved to be the critical shot. It hit the thing right between the eyes...right between Danny's eyes..., and blew a hole right through its skull. The thing grunted one last time before falling face first to the floor.

*Archer*

Archer held his scoped magnum tightly as he ran across the camp. Christa's screams had been so loud people in the Capital Wasteland could probably hear them, and Archer bolted towards the tent from which the screams had originated as fast as his legs would carry him. Finally he saw what looked like a medical tent, and smelt a horrific smell. _This is the place alright._ Archer thought grimly, before reading his magnum and bursting into the tent.

What he saw wasn't a hideous freak attacking the woman he still admittedly loved, but was that same woman locking lips with Enrique. This didn't surprise Archer in the slightest; the two had begun dating shortly before the trip, and hadn't bothered to keep it a secret. Still, whenever Archer and Christa were alone together, she had difficulty looking him in the eyes. This wasn't normal; she'd been fairly nonchalant about all the other men she'd dated since they'd broken up. With Enrique it was different however. Perhaps she felt that she was betraying him by sleeping with his best friend. Archer didn't feel betrayed, but that didn't mean he felt good about it. He always made sure to be as far away from Christa as possible whenever she started playing tonsil hockey with one of her boyfriends, of which there had been a few. He knew the relationship with Enrique wouldn't last, but still it pissed him off.

He coughed loudly when he realised there was no danger, holstering his magnum as he did so. Christa immediately separated from Enrique, quickly turning red. Enrique on the other hand looked very pleased with himself.

"It looks like you were late to the party amigo." He said with a grin, motioning casually to the 7ft tall corpse that lay face down in the middle of the tent.

"What happened?" Archer asked seriously. "I heard the screams."

"That...thing...came into the tent." Christa said, shaking despite herself. "It..it wore Danny's face." Archer's eyes widened in surprise. "It wore his face like a fucking mask!"

"What is it boss?" Enrique asked Archer, kicking the thing's corpse as he did so.

"I think it's one of the swamp folk." Archer replied, clearly unsure. "When we got off the boat, the captain said to watch out for swamp folk. He said they were inbred freaks."

"This ugly fucker certainly fits the bill." Enrique quipped.

"Are you alright?" Archer asked Christa, ignoring Enrique completely as he saw she was covered with blood.

"I'm fine." She answered, wiping some of the thing's blood from her face as she did so. "None of the blood is mine." Archer felt a small amount of relief. "Logan's seen better days though. The thing got a good hit on him." She motioned to Logan, who lay unconscious on the opposite side of the tent from Archer.

"He's a tough son of a bitch, he'll be fine." Archer said emotionlessly. It wasn't that he valued Logan's life less than that of his other allies; he just knew it would take more than a smack to the face to drop him.

"I'll treat him." Christa said, already going to where her medical equipment now lay on the floor.

"Good." Archer replied. "Enrique, drag the corpse out of here and dispose of it, then head back up to the watchtower."

"You've got it chief." Enrique replied, mockingly saluting Archer as he did so.

"Also, have any of you seen Todd?" Archer asked, unsure as to where the fifth member of their team was.

"Nope." Enrique replied casually. Christa shook her head, then turned back to her medical equipment.

"I'll go and find him. Be careful. That freak somehow managed to climb over the fence, so there's nothing stopping other swamp folk from doing the same. Keep an eye out Enrique." Enrique nodded, and with that Archer turned and left the tent.

*Todd*

It whispered. He had no idea what it was, but it whispered. The whispering was incomprehensible, yet irresistible. He'd first heard it while searching one of the interrogation rooms. The whispering had filled his ears and his mind, and he couldn't help but follow it. The whispering had led him to a concealed underground tunnel, clearly an escape tunnel designed by one of the prisoners.

Despite its age, the tunnel was still sturdy, and Todd had followed the whispering inside. The whispering had led him far underground, and as he'd carried on, it had grown darker and darker. Still he followed the whispering, because he couldn't think of anything else. Whenever he tried to think of another topic, the whispering rolled around in his skull again, and he continued to follow.

Now it was pitch black, but the whispering had grown louder. _I'm getting close._ Todd thought to himself as he neared whatever was whispering. If he'd been smarter, he would've wondered just what he was getting close to, and would've wondered with apprehension. He wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed by any stretch of the imagination however, and the sensible thought didn't cross his mind. He saw light at the end of the tunnel, and walked into a small chamber.

The chamber was completely empty apart from a ladder, and a corpse. The corpse is what lit the chamber; more precisely the corpse's Pip Boy was what lit the chamber. The dead man's Pip Boy light was still on. The whispering stopped as Todd entered the chamber, and he felt a bit dizzy as his normal mental faculties returned to him, as unenviable as they were.

He looked around the chamber, trying to remember what had made him want to walk down here. His gaze rested on the ladder, which rose up to a hatch on the ceiling. Before Todd could ponder this, the hatch opened, and Archer poked his head through.

"Todd?" He asked, clearly confused. He looked as if he'd just been in a trance, and his brain had just started working properly again. Todd had no idea that he looked exactly the same.

*Archer*

"Hey boss." Todd said casually.

"What the hell are you doing down here?"

"I...I don't know." Todd replied, a puzzled look on his face. "What are you doing here?" He asked in response. Archer tried to answer, but then realised he had no idea what the answer was.

"I'm not sure either." His brow furrowed in confusion. "I think..."Archer paused for a second as he scanned his mind for some reason, some motivation that explained why he was now looking into a hatch outside the prison, into an underground chamber in which Todd stood, with a corpse at his side. His memory of the last minute or two were hazy, but he remembered hearing something. A voice?

"A whisper." Todd remembered suddenly, finishing Archer's thought for him. "I heard someone...or something...whispering, and I followed it."

"I think you're not the only one." Archer replied, confused as to just what was going on.

"The whispering...it came from in here." Todd's eyes scanned the chamber again as he spoke.

"I doubt it was the corpse." Archer sighed, then started to climb down the ladder. "Let's have a look shall we?" The second Archer's feet touched the floor of the chamber, Todd screamed in pain. His hands went to his head, then darted to his ears. As quickly as the invisible affliction had begun, it ended, and Todd looked Archer dead in the eye.

"The corpse." Todd said suddenly, but with complete certainty. "The whispering is coming from the corpse. Something in the dead guy's pockets is what's whispering."

"Are you sure?" Archer asked dubiously.

"I heard it boss, I heard the whispering again. It was coming from inside one of the corpse's pockets." Archer was about to question Todd, then decided not to bother. _What harm can possibly come from searching a corpse?_ He thought to himself, before walking over to the body.

The corpse was unusual, in that there was not a scratch on the dead man's entire body. That wasn't all however. The corpse hadn't rotted in the slightest. _This man only died a short while ago._ Archer realised. _Maybe just before we arrived._ Despite his uninjured appearance, the man had a look of complete dread on his face. The look of horror chilled even Archer to the bone, a man who had seen a Super Mutant rip out a wastelander's spine, head and all.

Taking his eyes away from the man's facial expression, Archer began to search him. The man was wearing a brown hooded sweatshirt over a white t-shirt and baggy white trousers: a wasteland wanderer outfit. Archer reached into the pockets of the sweatshirt and found only a 10mm pistol and some ammo. He ignored these finds, and pulled off the man's sweatshirt. Underneath, he found that the man was wearing a satchel around his waist. He opened the satchel, and found himself face to face with the source of the whispering.

It was a book. This was no ordinary book however. The whispering started again, this time louder than before and coming from inside Archer's skull. He didn't **hear** it, he **thought** it. Archer felt like his skull was going to split in half, and cried out in pain as the whispering filled his mind.

"SHUT UP!" He yelled at the book, before grabbing it and throwing it across the chamber. The book hit the wall with a quiet thud, before dropping to the floor. The whispering instantly stopped, much to Archer's relief. He felt dizziness overtake him, and leaned against the wall to steady himself. He realised that a cold sweat had overtaken him, and he quickly wiped sweat from his forehead.

"Are you alright boss?" Archer didn't answer, because he didn't know. He didn't know what that book had done to him. There was something seriously wrong with the book, that much was certain. Now that it was no longer trying to rip apart his skull, Archer approached the book, and examined it.

The book looked innocent enough. It was made of brown leather, and looked to have quite a few pages. Some pages seemed to be loose, as if a clumsy oaf had tried to read it and accidentally ripped the pages out. The book had what looked to be a red scar on its front cover. At first Archer thought the scar was dripping blood, but then he blinked and saw that it was bone dry.

"Boss, look!" Todd called. Archer turned to face him, and saw that Todd was rooting around in the satchel. He turned away from the corpse and held a small object in the air, obviously found in the satchel.

"Is that a holotape?" Archer asked no-one in particular. It was. Curious, Archer walked over to the dead man, and inserted the holotape into the Pip Boy. Immediately a male voice filled the room.

"Hello?" The voice said. "Sorry, I've never recorded a holotape before. Alright, if you're listening to this, I'm dead. I won't be alive for much longer anyway." The voice didn't seem too upset by its imminent demise. "Death comes as a relief actually, because I won't have to listen to this damn book whispering to me anymore. But I'm getting ahead of myself." The voice took a deep breath, then continued. "My name is Lucas Pryor. I'm a scavenger, as I'm sure you are. While searching a cave not too far from here, I found a book. I hadn't found anything of value yet, and at this point I was desperate to salvage something. ANYTHING. Against my better judgement, I took the book."

"The swamp folk didn't like that. They'd made some kind of altar in that cave, and seemed to be worshipping the book. They weren't pleased when I took it. I managed to make my way to Turtledove Detention camp, a place I'm sure you've visited already. I found a tunnel in an interrogation room, and made my way inside, trying to hide from the swamp folk who were hot on my tail. I waited in the chamber you stand in right now, listening to those freaks as they looked for me above. Eventually, I heard them walk away, and tried to leave. I couldn't however."

"I heard the book whispering, as I 'm sure you have. The whispering seemed to fill my head, and I couldn't think of anything else. After listening to it for a few minutes, I began to understand the whispering. It told me not to move. It told me to stay in this chamber. I laughed it off and walked towards the ladder, but found I didn't want to climb it. I tried to will myself to climb, but I couldn't. I could've sworn I heard the book laugh as I realised there was no way out.

I've been here for what my Pip Boy tells me is several days. I've exhausted all my provisions, and now I find that I can't even get up from where I'm sitting. The book...it's forcing me to stay here till I either starve or go mad. At this point, I don't know which will happen first. I know I'll die soon, and I welcome it. But this book...it must be destroyed. Left with nothing else to do, I read the book. The insanity within almost destroyed my mind, but I learnt about the book. I learnt its name. It's called the Krivbeknih – I have no idea if I'm pronouncing that right. I also learnt about a stone obelisk in a place called Dunwich, back in the Capital Wasteland. The obelisk contains great power, but if the Krivbeknih is placed against the obelisk, it should destroy the book."

"I'm so hungry, I can barely even think straight anymore. It looks like my sanity is going to end before my life. Please, if you're reading this, go back to the Capital Wasteland, find the place called Dunwich, and destroy this godforsaken book." There was silence, and Archer assumed the recording was over. Suddenly, the voice of Lucas Pryor spoke up again, but it was different. Now it sounded deranged, unnatural and – Archer didn't know how he knew this but he did – evil.

"Ug-Qualtoth!" The voice screamed madly. "Skinless one, I am coming to deep temple! Died, Ug-Qualtoth again. I'll be there soon whisperer, I'll be there. Abdul prays to the sharp knife, prays to cut deep temple. Alhazred! G'yeth!" The recording finally ended after that, leaving Archer to contemplate the madness that he just heard.

_This is insane. _He thought as he leant against the wall, looking at Lucas Pryor's corpse and remembering what he had said in life. Archer didn't doubt that the book was evil, but the rest of it, about it forcing him to stay in the chamber and starve, was madness. Archer would've dismissed it immediately, had he not heard the whispers and felt that damn book slithering inside his skull. Lucas had begged anyone who listened to destroy the book. Then..._Then he went mad._ Archer tried to remember the mad gibberish that had come from Lucas' mouth. _Alhazred? Ug-Qualtoth? G'yeth? What the fuck? _It wasn't uncommon for wastelanders to be driven mad by the desolate world in which they lived, and Archer had heard many a crazy bastard shout gibberish. This had been unlike any he'd heard before however. He'd never heard madness like what had afflicted Lucas Pryor in his last moments. _What should I do about the book?_

As Archer pondered this, he didn't hear the whispers. He didn't hear them enter Todd's mind, didn't see Todd's hands go to his head as the whispers filled his skull. He didn't notice Todd walk over to the book, and crouch next to it. He only noticed something was wrong when he casually glanced in Todd's direction, and saw that he was opening the book. A bloodcurdling dread filled Archer as the book slowly opened. He didn't know how he knew, but he knew that that book should not be opened.

"STOP!" He yelled at Todd. Todd completely ignored him. He couldn't hear anything, the whispers were too loud. Archer dashed towards Todd but it was too late. The book opened, and he heard a shriek with malevolence of which mankind has never known, and evil so potent that it could make a man rip his eyes out in horror. The shriek was impossibly loud, and it filled the tiny chamber. Not content with that however, it burst through the open hatch and filled Point Lookout, screaming its darkness to the swamp and all of its denizens.

_**Darkness is free. Doom descends upon our heroes. Will they survive?**_

_**Please review, as I need tips to improve my horror writing skill. Pretty please?**_


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